


Any moment 'til the day breaks

by perleri



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Character Study, Dissociation, Gen, M/M, andrew is barely in this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-24
Updated: 2016-11-24
Packaged: 2018-09-01 20:31:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8637097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perleri/pseuds/perleri
Summary: It was Wednesday so it was easy to slip out unnoticed. Neil was glad. He didn't want to have to lie to any fox that saw him. He wouldn't have to find out if the face of another fox would break his resolve or if he was too far gone to care. That was one of the scariest part, the ice overtaking his lungs, the numbness in his chest, how easy it always was to fall back into what he hated.And it was, easy that is. Maybe Andrew's cold words helped him along, maybe the anniversary of when he first went on the run pushed him some more, and maybe the nightmare full of dead bodies and blood sent him over the edge. But the edge had always been there, and it seemed like Neil had never stepped back.---In which Neil has a pretty bad day if I do say so myself.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ReadingAlpacas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReadingAlpacas/gifts).



> Hey guys! So I wrote this a long while back but have been too lazy to post it until now. I kind of surprised myself by having my first TFC fic be centered around Neil. I always imagined I would write something Andrew-centric, or even something more romance-based than this. Anyway this is what I got instead. The whole fic is Neil dissociating so, please, if that triggers you don't read this!  
> As always shout-out to ReadingAlpacas because she's always the one I can turn to and rant. I love you and I miss you, see you in December
> 
> (also the title comes from the song Jailbreak by AWOLNATION - 10/10 Neil song I completely recommend it)

It was strange how many events could coincide without someone noticing. A fight and a date and a memory morphing together in Neil's brain. A storm.

Neil thought about this as he grabbed his old duffel bag. It wasn't buried too deep in the closet. Neil had used it recently when he went for a light workout to the gym. But he hadn't used it for this purpose in over a year.

The clothes were simple: four tshirts that no one would immediately notice missing, boxers, some socks, a pair of sturdy jeans. Everything else he was already wearing, up to the all-weather jacket tied around his waist. In the haze of his mind he knew that there were enough items still left in the drawers to not raise suspicion with the new clothes Allison had bought left untouched. He knew this but some part of him still hoped that someone would be smart enough to see the difference.

Another part knew that the only person who would notice wouldn't care.

It was Wednesday so it was easy to slip out unnoticed. Neil was glad. He didn't want to have to lie to any fox that saw him. He wouldn't have to find out if the face of another fox would break his resolve or if he was too far gone to _care_. That was one of the scariest part, the ice overtaking his lungs, the numbness in his chest, how easy it always was to fall back into what he hated.

And it was, easy that is. Maybe Andrew's cold words helped him along, maybe the anniversary of when he first went on the run pushed him some more, and maybe the nightmare full of dead bodies and blood sent him over the edge. But the edge had always been there, and it seemed like Neil had never stepped back.

_Andrew was shaking. Neil saw his tightly curled fist, how white his knuckles turned, and how deep his fingernails bit into the palm of his hands. Andrew was holding back the fear Neil could see in his eyes._

_It was something Neil was never even able to imagine._

_"I just wanted you to admit it. Throw me a bone or something, Andrew. It's not that hard," but it was that hard. Neil was seeing how the proof of the difficulty right now._

_Any runner could recognize the signs in someone's body before they bolt. Andrew was in fight or flight mode, and his body screamed of running._

_He chose to fight instead._

_"Don't think you can tell me what to do, Neil," he scoffed and turned his head._

Before he ran to the nearest bus stop he gave himself one minute to mourn. What he was grieving over, he didn't know. Maybe it was the foxes. It could just be the entire future he thought he had ahead of him. He didn't know how he had let himself get this far in this fantasy of his. None of this was real. If the steady strength of Andrew beside him could be lost in an instance, what did that mean for the rest of the foolish dream Neil had imagined?

He didn't have to wait long. The bus ran every twenty minutes and Neil wasn't in the right state of mind to note the passing of time. As he sat down he did an instinctive sweep of the area outside the bus window. The foxes would be sure he was gone by now. Neil wasn't known for skipping practice, but he figured they would rationalize his disappearance with him being with Andrew. They had noticed the tension between the two yesterday, so maybe they thought they had both skipped their responsibilities to makeup. It wasn't too far-fetched, and the foxes would think anything other than the idea that Neil would run from them.

_It was a stand off._

_Both knew the power of silence, both had utilized it in full many times before. Neil had gotten comfortable in mouthing off but he felt himself shrinking as the seconds passed by. His sleep deprived mind conjured images of his mother's sneer, his mother's quiet rage, his mother's all too familiar slap._

_Neil wasn't, could never be, scared of Andrew. At that moment it wasn't Andrew that struck fear into his bones, it was the idea of his life, this life, crumbling around him. It was his mother's voice telling him to run, the first thing she whispered when they left the life with his father behind and the last thing she ever whispered into his ear._

_Run._

By the time he got to the highway, he didn't feel very much like Neil. He didn't feel like Nathaniel either. He felt like what he was in between cities and countries, nameless and _nothing_.

He flagged down a truck, put on a smile, and got into the seat headed _anywhere is fine_. The older man looked intimidating, but Neil wasn't stupid. Alongside his clothing was a switchblade and it made him feel sick.

He wasn't used to carrying weapons, his mother took care of that most of the time. His time at Millport was so uneventful he never felt the need to grab anything, and then Palmetto happened and weapons felt useless against the threats he faced. Now, he grabbed a switchblade from the bottom of the drawer Andrew had hidden it in.

_"Andrew."_

_Andrew had to hear something in his voice. He had to._

_"If you're waiting for something you're wasting your time."_

_Please not now. Neil couldn't deal with this now._

_"I don't think I'm wasting anything."_

_"You're wasting my time," Andrew's lips twitched, "so leave. If you're looking for anything more than this pathetic attraction, leave."_

_The thing is, Neil knew Andrew didn't fully mean it. Neil knew Andrew was panicking and when Andrew panicked he got cruel. Neil knew Andrew had told him to stay more times than he would ever tell Neil to leave._

_The words hurt anyway._

Neil got dropped off five rest stops away. The hours that passed felt both endless and infinitesimal. The truck driver asked Neil if he was sure he wanted to be dropped off there, and Neil confidently nodded.

He looked for the stand of maps common in all rest stops, and took note of where he was. In him itched the worry of not being far enough, but his thoughts couldn't settle enough to pay attention to it.

He wasn't sure he was thinking at all. Hours had passed in that truck but Neil couldn't remember one second of it. The bus ride felt lifetimes away. He felt lost in his years on the run, lost between names and accents and hair dye.

He drank from the old water fountain, and splashed the warm water on his face hoping for something to wake him up from this dream. 

The thing about running away that people didn't realize was that it wasn't always the running part that was important. Sometimes it was the away part that mattered most.

Neil rubbed at his wet face and wondered if he would ever feel far away enough, or if he was doomed to the incessant pull of the foxes waiting for him.

And then his phone rang.

It woke him in the way the water couldn't. The vibration felt akin to the shock of a bullet piercing his shoulder. The sound like his mother's commands to leave. It was grounding and real and Neil felt like he opened his eyes after a nightmare.

God what was he doing?

The phone stopped ringing by the time he got it out of his pocket.

Neil stared at it in wonder. A sharp fear cut through his body as he realized that the last few hours were hidden by a dense numbness in his brain. Nothing was coming up other than the memory of his steady breathing, steady hands, and terrifyingly steady legs as he walked from one mode of transportation to the other.

Somewhere along the way Neil had grabbed his phone and turned it off as he left. Somewhere in this dead rest stop Neil had turned it on. Something in his mind longed for his home so much it broke through years of conditioning.

Neil could almost smile.

The phone rang again and this time he answered it.

He couldn't speak, and Andrew seemed lost for words on the other side of the phone too. It was as if neither of them could believe the miracle of an answered phone.

"Where are you?" Andrew broke the silence. Neil's mind and body were still reeling from the whiplash of waking up. Everything was catching up with him and suddenly Neil felt overwhelmed by the sensations. He could feel the heaviness of his feet, the tension in his shoulders, the drastic pounding in his head.

"Neil, where are you?" Andrew said, clear and crisp. Neil kept trying to get his voice to work.

"The rest stop off 88. Exit 8a." Neil didn't have to look at the map again to know. The details of his trip were slowly coming back and the directions were clear in his mind. "A couple of hours from the school."

Neil might have imagined the little sigh that escaped Andrew when he heard Neil talk. He definitely didn't imagine the heavy breathing on the other side.

"Don't move from where you are. I'm coming to get you," Andrew's voice was deep and dangerous and Neil didn't know what to do with that.

"Andrew I'm-" Neil cut himself off. He didn't know where he was going with the sentence, but he wanted to say something. Something that could magically set all of this right, that could take the edge off Andrew's voice.

Neil wanted to explain himself, but the only words that could make this better were lies and neither of them deserved that.

"I'll wait here," Neil said instead.


End file.
